When reading prequels, it can be either two things: good or bad. Good is because it directly relates to the future and always references to events and characters of the future. Bad because they don’t even make even a slight reference to the future. These types of prequel just want to alienate the readers to the future, to make a new story out of the past without even touching the future. This type of prequel is good if the readers has not read the future but if the reader has, it’ll just be boring.

But what about Birth of a Killer? Where does Birth of a Killer stands? It is without a doubt on the good side because it constantly makes hints of the future and explains some mysteries of the future in it. An example is where did Crepsley’s orange hair came from. That question was answered in this prequel in which it was from a dye that his boss uses to identify workers. Apparently the dye sticks to the skin and is almost impossible to remove, even after hundreds of years. That is where Crepsley’s unhealthy orange hair came from.

This prequel about Larten Crepsley is really good as it answers many, many questions that existed and emerged during The Saga of Darren Shan. Larten Crepsley was truly a mystery that his past could not be told by just a couple of chapters unlike Beranabus from Darren Shan’s The Demonata. His past was explained in just three chapters in Death’s Shadow but I bet that if he wanted, Darren Shan could probably make a series of his past. But if he wanted to do Crepsley as he did Beranabus could he? I think not.

Larten Crepsley past is really fascinating and detailed. If Darren Shan wanted to shorten it to just three chapters, not only would it be hard but also very boring and stale. So it was a good decision to make a four-book series out of him. In just the first book we have seen lots of sides and secrets of Larten Crepsley unknown previously. Who was the first vampire he had met? How had he become its assistant? How was he blooded? And how he had first encountered the vampaneze and Murlough. That was an intense scene. And right at the end of Birth of a Killer, how he had met Desmond Tiny or rather, how Mr. Tiny first became interested in him (which would later shape the whole of The Saga of Darren Shan).

Written in the third-person (unlike The Saga of Darren Shan and The Demonata), Birth of a Killer is an eloquent story of Crepsley’s past life before he had met Darren Shan, before he had met Steve Leopard and before he had died fighting the vampaneze. This is truly a new kind of prequel that serves to be a children’s masterpiece, hands down!